Young talent will take a step down to Glud & Marstrand following two tough seasons with QuickStep
2010 has not been a great year for young, highly-touted Danish talents. Rasmus Guldhammer sparkled on several occasions with HTC-Columbia, but at the end of his neo-pro season, opted to return to his homeland for a year to gain some more experience and maturity before heading back to the highest level.
The same situation appears to be the case with another prodigal talent from Denmark, Thomas Vedel Kvist. Only 20 years old at the time, the Danish rider with heaps of promise signed with Patrick Lefevere’s QuickStep team at the end of the 2008 season following a dominating performance at the Grand Prix des Nations in Canada with the QuickStep feeder team, Beveren 2000. There was much hope that he could be the next big Danish star, but little came of it over the next two seasons.
Feltet.dk reports that a crash and slow recovery period certainly did not help the young rider’s possibilities, but Patrick Lefevere’s team is also a notoriously tough environment for all but the few that succeed early and quickly.
All is not lost for Kvist though. Like Guldhammer, he will return home to Denmark next season to race with a lower level team. In the case of Kvist, now all of 23 years old, he’ll race for the Danish powerhouse, Glud & Marstrand team in 2011.
Team director, Michael Skelde, was pleased to announce his big signing.
“It was a childhood dream that came true when Thomas turned professional with QuickStep, but he still has time ahead of him to become a ProTour writer again. At Glud & Marstrand, we have a proud tradition of ex-QuickStep riders. Mads Christensen returned to the ProTour after a year with us, and we also believe that will be the case with Thomas. With Thomas on the team, we will be very strong when we hit the hilly terrain.”
Team manager, Christa Skelde, is also excited at the prospect of working with Kvist, not only due to his obvious abilities on the bike, but in terms of helping the rider return to the level that was apparent early on and has been left in the shadows of late.
“We will give him the best support and ballast, so he can blossom again and get back to the ProTour. We have a proud tradition of helping people, and we can go beyond the technical cycling aspect and also deal with the personal and mental things in his luggage.”